Haiku Form. Joan Giroux
(Greater Vehicle). The essential difference between the two is that, whereas the goal of Hinayana Buddhism is Nirvana, Mahayana Buddhism teaches that men who attain Buddhahood should turn in compassion towards their fellow men, who are all capable of being saved. The Buddhist saints who help men to attain salvation are known as bodhisattvas. According to W. E. Soothill's abridged version of The Lotus of the Wonderful Law, "through the inspiration and compassionate care of these bodhisattvas, all men may ultimately achieve salvation."1 As Soothill's summary indicates, those who held the earlier teaching of Gautama did not necessarily receive the new doctrine with enthusiasm:
[Buddha] is aware that many who have followed his earlier teachings, including the practice of severe disciplines, will feel cheated rather than be rejoiced . . . that Buddhahood is open to all . . . rather than only to the few who have prepared themselves for the attainment of Nirvana. These are identified as followers of the Hinayana.2
Mahayana Buddhism was further developed by the Chinese and Japanese who adapted it to the culture of their countries. The Chinese fused it with Taoism and Confucianism and, incorporating the special Indian type of meditation called Dhyana, developed a new form of Buddhism, known as Ch'an (Zen). The Japanese welcomed all of these branches of Chinese religion and fused them with Shinto to produce new Buddhist forms, including Zen. All of these strains, but especially Zen, provided a rich cultural background for haiku.
Taoism, based on the writings of Lao-tsu (in Japanese, Roshi), dating from the sixth century B.C., received further development from Chuang-tzu (Soshi; 364?-286? B.C.). The word Tao (literally, "the Way") also refers to the principle of all things, antedating all things and forming their substance. It is spiritual (and therefore invisible), inaudible, vague and elusive; yet there is in it form and essence. It is nonbeing in the sense that it is prior to and above all things, and in its operation it is characterized by wu-wei (no action), by which is meant no unnatural action. (This may be analogous to the Greek notion of primeval stasis.) Natural action, which leads to a life of peace, harmony and enlightenment, is compared to weak, yielding things—water, woman, an infant. There is nothing better than water for attacking strong, hard things. The great stress on natural simplicity and on a life of plainness—in which profit is discarded, cleverness abandoned, selfishness eliminated and desires reduced —is essentially a romantic emphasis. Lao-tsu also emphasized the phenomenon of change. Yet all things are one, for Tao embraces them and combines them, uniting transcendental mysticism with dynamic realism. The outstanding characteristic of popular Taoism is its simple desire for heaven, according to an early Japanese Buddhist, Kukai, who wrote of the ten stages of religious experience.
The mind infantile and without fears.
The pagan hopes for birth in heaven, there for a while to know peace.
He is like an infant, like a calf that follows its mother.3
In the interaction of the two religions, Taoists assimilated Buddhist ideas while Buddhism took over Taoist philosophic terms as well as the concepts of being and nonbeing. Taoism's greatest influence on Buddhism was in the development of Zen Buddhism. As an example of Taoist influence on haiku, there is a poem by Basho which is almost proverbial among educated Japanese:
Mono ieba Kuchibiru samushi Aki no kaze
When I speak,
My lips feel cold—
The autumn wind.
This resembles closely the verse of Lao-tsu:
Those who know, speak not.
Those who speak, know not.
Miyamori Asataro writes of Basho's haiku that it is a didactic verse which means: "Keep silence, otherwise evil will overtake you."4
The thought of Confucius, also fused with Buddhism, was subsequently to influence Zen. Confucianism, while inculcating strong attachment to duty, emphasized the happiness flowing from obedience to the various commitments of husbands and wives, parents and children, brothers and sisters, men and their friends, rulers and their subjects. Thus society was a great, Utopian family, in which all enjoyed the rights of age and status. It was upheld by spiritual forces, especially the complex of "Love Powers" which are continually radiating from human hearts. Confucianism in Japan, in its stress on loyalty to one's superior, helped to foster the austere, Zen-loving warrior class to which Basho belonged. To haiku this religion contributed, according to R. H. Blyth, "a certain sobriety, reserve . . . brevity and pithiness, and a moral flavour that may sometimes be vaguely felt, but is never allowed to be separated . . . from the poetry itself."5 The rationalism of Confucius is a "classical" influence in contrast to the "romantic" influence of Taoism.
INFLUENCE OF CHINESE POETRY AND ART
Even greater than the influence of Confucianism was the effect on haiku of the Chinese poetry which entered Japan with Buddhism. This poetry, for all its romance, nostalgia, world-weariness (and also, at least according to Ezra Pound, its pure colour) is, above all, permeated with Ch'an Buddhism and Taoism. A comparison of Chinese and Japanese poetry reveals that Chinese poetry deals with vast vistas, whereas Japanese poetry tends to focus attention on the small; where Chinese poetry presents the historical past, Japanese poetry presents the individual past in an historical setting. Chinese poetry will describe space in terms of ranges of mountains, whereas Japanese poetry will describe it in the sky of day and night. Two types of Chinese poems in particular appeal to the Japanese—those speaking of a life of solitude, showing the Ch'an Buddhist influence, and those describing rain. (There are scores of synonyms for rain in the Japanese language.) Because the Chinese poet is in tune with the Taoist universe, his poetry reflects the world as in an undistorted mirror. What he expresses as personal feeling is also universal law. His poetry is suprapersonal, extrapersonal. He stands outside his own personal attitudes and regards them objectively, as do Basho and Buson, who are both particularly influenced by Chinese poetry. Basho absorbs the Chinese influence completely and then produces his own new and different poetry with almost no borrowing, as can be seen by comparing Basho's haiku with Lao-tsu's saying (see p. 30). Buson takes whole phrases from Chinese poets but puts them into new settings and gives them new meaning.
Shosho no
Kari no namida ya
Oboro-zuki
Tears
For the wild geese of Shosho;
A hazy moon.
This poem was written by Buson, as he states, while listening to the lute one evening. It echoes verses by the famous Chinese poet Senki:
—Returning Wild Geese—
Why do they so blindly depart from Shosho?
The water is blue, the sand is white, the moss on both banks green;
Should the lute of twenty-five strings be played, on a moonlit night,
With the overwhelming emotion will they not return?
Blyth states that the lute of 25 strings was played by Gao and Joei, the two daughters of Gyo, who both died at this spot. The "tears" of Buson's verse are connected with the two sisters.6
Chinese art, as well as Chinese poetry, reflects religion and influences haiku deeply. The romantic Chinese paintings are Taoistic in that they show men as very small beings amid overpoweringly intense landscapes. By comparison the sumi-e (black-and-white ink drawings) introduced into Japan by Zen priests are extremely simple. These intuitive drawings express the essence of the subject in a few rough, uncorrected brush strokes. This essence is more important than technique or beauty. From sumi-e developed haiga, small pictures in black and white or in simple colours on the same paper as a haiku. They either illustrate the haiku,, saying the same thing in a different way, or they reinforce it by introducing a new concept, thus deepening the meaning of the haiku. It was Zen which appropriated both Chinese art and Chinese poetry and placed them at the disposal of haiku.
SHINTO
Having gathered richness and depth in China, Mahayana Buddhism was to encounter further enriching